


the thin chalk line between the sun and the stars

by citrus_cola



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Child Neglect, Found Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Mer Wilbur Soot, Merpeople, Minor Character Death, Mute Wilbur Soot, Panic Attacks, Sleepy Bois Inc Angst, Wilbur Soot-centric, all of these are characters not creators btw, but not quite since it isn't dreamsmp, more tags will be added as story progresses
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-17
Updated: 2021-03-22
Packaged: 2021-03-26 13:35:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30106776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/citrus_cola/pseuds/citrus_cola
Summary: Wilbur Soot is the prince of the North Sea, but that means next to nothing. The waters are grey and gloomy, about as soulless as he, and one day, he is meant to inherit them, take his place on the throne, and rot away, a ruling slave to the Heart of the Sea. But there's another world, Wilbur knows, a strange and unfamiliar one he ventures out to in order to escape his cold palace in the watery depths. Though it's forbidden, he sometimes catches himself nearing the human's world at night in order to sing to the stars. And it's fine, everything is fine. After all, he's never been caught before.That is, until one golden-haired human boy throws his entire life into disarray.
Relationships: Wilbur Soot & Phil Watson, Wilbur Soot & Technoblade, Wilbur Soot & Technoblade & TommyInnit & Phil Watson, Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
Comments: 42
Kudos: 158





	1. I bite my tongue, I hold my breath

**Author's Note:**

> Based on both the Disney and Hans Christian Andersen versions of The Little Mermaid. Trigger/ content warnings will be provided before each chapter.
> 
> \---
> 
> "None was as full of longing as the youngest one, the very princess who had the longest time to wait and who was so quiet and thoughtful. Many a night she would stand at the open window and gaze up through the dark-blue water, where the fishes swished their fins and tails. She could see the moon and the stars, their gleam was admittedly somewhat pale, but through the water they looked much larger than they do to our eyes."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Do the stars swim with you?”
> 
> Wilbur fumbles, the notes cracking and then stopping altogether as he whips around.
> 
> On the beach, a child stares in complete wonder, his eyes blue as the Heart of the Sea and his hair a scruffy blond. But he’s human, standing on two feet with toes that are curled into the white sand beneath him.
> 
> Oh Poseidon, Wilbur’s done it now.

The North Sea is cold, gloomy, and colorless, making it quite possibly the worst possible place to be a mer born into royalty. A crown on your head and ancient bloodlines are as good as shackling you to the sea floor, binding you in the promise of _here you shall stay ‘till the end of your days._

The English Channel lies South, a hub of mer communication, underwater high society, and endless nights of parties that never rest. And to the North, the Norwegian Sea holds peaceful and serene, a paradise of sunrises and sunsets that stun even the most ancient mer. The water between the two, though, is murky and muddy. Skies of unceasing grey roll above like a carpet, choking out the sun and leaving the water freezing and dark. The mer there don’t celebrate like their English Channel brethren or their settled, blissful Norwegian Sea neighbors.

The North Sea is just a place to waste away your days and eventually return to seafoam.

Even the central palace is dull. The stone slates of the walls are devoid of carvings or runes. And the inner workings of the castle are even emptier. A king of nothing and a prince of even less sit atop their opaque, glassy teal thrones. Only the most loyal of servants float through the hidden stairwells and passageways, seemingly either remaining in service out of the hopes of recognition or out of pure stupidity.

The prince envies the free-roaming merfolk. Poseidon, he wishes he could follow them, wishes he could leave this hollow realm of shadow and mud and seek out the enchanted lives of the restless, lively, travelling civilians elsewhere. They are more blessed than he. Better to be born like them than to be born royal here.

After the evening’s lessons- taught by a single, wilted sack of bones and scales he calls Grumps- and just as his father thinks him sealed in his bedroom chambers for the night, he sneaks between the palace’s pillars and gates, and swims as fast as his fins can carry him.

He skids around a corner and promptly collides with a fish.

“ _Milo,_ ” he hisses, but there is no maliciousness, just light-hearted concern. “You’re gonna get me caught.”

The fish spins in happy, ignorant circles around his index finger. He sighs. “You can’t come where I’m going. You should go back to your school.”

Milo doesn’t seem to hear, though, and the prince gives up with a huff of air, sliding back into the current and letting it take him far away, the yellow goatfish hot on his tail. Leaving the motionless castle behind him, he ventures out into the murky waters which will one day become his domain.

Wilbur Soot is the prince of the North Sea. Prince of wasted dreams and perhaps insomnia, but also the prince of song.

Tonight, he wishes to sing the stars to the sea.

The palace is not far off the English coast, hidden to those above through the use of discreet stone as its foundations and ridiculous amounts of enchantments. It is only a ten minute’s swim from it to the land and while, yes, technically Wilbur is forbidden from even _thinking_ to journey on land, he has a hidden spot on a beachside where no one has ever caught him before.

The Wash, the Fens, he knows these places by name from years of lessons and poring over maps, but it is near impossible to picture them just from the faded lines of jagged writing sprawled across yellowed scrolls.

Wilbur breaks the water’s surface, and the transition from using his gills to gasping through his lungs hits him like a brick. He splutters in the air, hacking up like he’d just choked. Milo stares on blankly. Fish aren’t much for friends, but it’s all Wilbur’s got, so he says his goodbyes and parts ways.

Not too far in the distance, the coastline rises in chalky, streaky cliffsides, sharp and serrated but beckoning all the same. If one were to really squint, they might make out a faint cluster of rocks that rose from the shallows to just a few feet from the beach’s sand. Wilbur swims towards it, heart in his throat, breathing heavily still as he has not adapted to the open, unfiltered oxygen quite yet.

The water grows the slightest bit clearer, and the sea floor rises rapidly as he races ever nearer the stone. Adrenaline courses through his veins, warming his cheeks and chasing away the glacial kiss of the icy water against his skin.

At last, he reaches the patch of rocks and clings to it as though it’s a lifeline, hoisting himself up with his weak arm muscles and sprawling across to look at the open world around him.

The coast comforts him. The sand is so close that he could reach out and grab a fistful if he wants to. To feel the dry grains running through a closed palm for the first time had taken him by shock. He hadn’t known things could be not wet, stupid as it sounds. The moon watches high above and is dressed in a gown of the cosmos, all twirled in endless stars and bedecked with eons-old planets.

It’s nights like these where things can be okay, for just a while.

Wilbur removes the circlet of entwined silver and pearls from his hair, the one that marks him as a noble, and places it gently onto the rock next to him. Closes his eyes. He doesn’t bother to feel pity for the diadem, even as its center crystal, the Heart of the Sea, whispers to his thoughts. No, tonight it is just him. There are no obligations, no restrictions on his power.

So Wilbur begins to sing.

It’s low and it’s mournful, but it carries out across the water and up to the above. It crescendos and it falls in loops and bounds, hymns and wordless riffs that wind and unravel with all the power of a god themself.

This, _this_ is his respite. This is _him_ and he feels so utterly in control that he forgets there are limits to the melodies put in place centuries ago. His song cascades from his lips before he can even think and the stars begin to _move_ in response.

They rattle and then sink ever so softly, floating like dust in the wind, like fishermen’s ships fall to the bottom of the sea during the most unforgiving of storms. The starlight pools in the ocean, spreading across the surface like milk in honeyed tea until it is the god’s tears sprawled across the surface, bleeding liquid _power_.

Wilbur continues his song, dipping his hands into the starlight. It hums in ethereal harmonies to synchronize the inner workings of the universe, not at all realizing that the _sky_ is in the _sea_ , and the heavens are rushing against the earth. It’s so fundamentally _wrong_ that Wilbur can’t help but hear a voice in the back of his head whisper that it’s right. That this is how the universe wants it, that everything is aligned with the somber woes of his voice pouring the celestial liquid from the black void above and pooling it where he can touch it.

“Do the stars swim with you?”

Wilbur fumbles, the notes cracking and then stopping altogether as he whips around.

On the beach, a child stares in complete wonder, his eyes blue as the Heart of the Sea and his hair a scruffy blond. But he’s human, standing on two feet with toes that are curled into the white sand beneath him.

_Oh Poseidon, Wilbur’s done it now._

The mer scrambles to think of what to do. The humans are _not_ supposed to know, the humans are supposed to be wholly oblivious, and now with one stupid night, Wilbur’s gone and destroyed millennia’s worth of work. They’ll hunt them down and they’ll snare them in nets and they’ll rip off their scales and-

“Can you speak?” The boy asks.

“Y- yes,” Wilbur responds, mostly out of shock. The stars still drip from his hands like oil. He can’t seem to rub it off. It stains him with guilt and he’s trying to decide whether just to slip off into the sea or face his mistakes when the boy speaks again.

“Do the stars swim with you?”

Wilbur blinks. Once. Twice. “Excuse me?”

“Well, I’ve been thinking lately a lot about mer lately and Dad tells me they’re not real, just a myth, but I find it unlikely because I’m always right and now you’re here and there’s stars in the water so I want to know if the stars swim with you. So I can tell him I was right. Sir.”

The last word seems to be an afterthought, but the politeness and calm in this child’s demeanor shakes Wilbur.

“It’s not- no, they don’t swim.”

“Hmm. No, I think they do.”

And then the kid is wafting through the water that goes up to his knees and climbing atop Wilbur’s rocks. He’s inches from him and this- this is not allowed, but neither was summoning the stars down and look at what he’s done now. Wilbur hesitates. He does not quite want to flee when someone who can _walk_ , someone who has complete and utter control over themselves, is sitting mere inches from him.

The kid, it seems, cannot seem to hold back his questions. “Are you a siren? You like to drive fishermen to their deaths?”

Wilbur makes a squalling sound in the back of his throat. “ _Stars_ , no.”

“Good.” The boy cups a hand into the water and suddenly he too has the stars running through his fingertips. He laughs in disbelief, in delight. “’Cause my dad’s a fisherman and if you were gonna try to drown him I think I’d have to leave.”

Wilbur, for all his shock, almost smiles. “No, no. The sirens are only in the far North.” They sing to the glaciers more than men, he leaves out. He met a siren once, though, in a diplomatic meeting. Thinking about it now, he cringes at the memory of sharp teeth and even sharper nails. Sirens are more _instinct_ than anything, far more likely to divert into predators than mer are if given the chance.

Something dark rolls in his veins as he turns over the child’s words in his mind. This kid’s dad is a fisherman? Did he see him from somewhere on the cliffside above and send his child down to berate Wilbur with questions, to obtain valuable information that he will use to snare him and fry him for dinner?

“Where do _you_ live, then?”

Wilbur shakes his head. He will _not_ betray his kind, even if, just by sitting here, he already has in a way. “Can’t tell you that.”

The boy pouts. “Fine. Can I at least have your name?”

Wilbur falters. Drags his tail through the starlight on the water, admiring the way his black scales catch the liquid. It’s like he’s the night sky in itself, the way the reflections and gold wash across the ebony canvas that is his tail.

To give a human his name is _too_ much. It is a sign of trust and that’s something he cannot quite spare right now.

“No, sorry.”

“Well, that sucks. I’m Tommy, by the way, and I’m telling you just to show you how much of a prick you are for not doing the same.” He pauses, then adds, “Prick.”

Wilbur doesn’t know if he’s supposed to be offended by that, but he splashes his tail just a bit harder than normal, sending a spray of water dancing across Tommy’s face.

The expression he gets in return is well worth it.

“Oi! Don’t try me.” But the kid is smiling and Wilbur’s heart feels lighter than it ever has before.

He stills. Why is he not turning tail and swimming away as fast as he can?

Why is he answering, even if it’s just in blunt, worthless phrases?

He bites his tongue.

Why does he want to stay?

His mind argues with itself, running in circles, until eventually he decides that he will remain. He will remain, he tries to reassure himself, if only to make sure the kid isn’t going to run off to the nearest human and send a fleet of fishing vessels after him and the underwater kingdom. The lie is almost convincing, and he shoves down any piece of him that’s saying he wants to learn, to hear. His eyes keep drifting back to the human’s legs. What is it like to _walk to run to dance to breathe this air all the time what is it, I need to know_ , but _no- you’re being an idiot,_ so he swallows the words back.

Which is fine, since the silence is filled with Tommy asking his own questions, shooting them off like he’s had them memorized, one right after the next. He’s a bundle of curiosity and Wilbur answers only what he finds harmless, even as his stomach churns with fear because _holy Poseidon, he’s interacting with a human and the gods must be furious._

“What do you eat?”

“Seaweed, mostly.”

Tommy scrunches his nose up. “Okay, gross. Umm… what about fish? Can you understand them?”

“Gods, I _wish_. Would make things a lot easier.” Wilbur rolls the tension out of his shoulders, which draws Tommy’s attention to the shimmering black scales that adorn the skin there.

“Do mer’s tails come in different colors?”

Wilbur sighs. “In other places, yes. Here, no. We’re all monochrome and dull.”

Tommy’s lips twist and his tone swings just a bit. “I think your tail’s pretty, if it makes you feel any better.”

It’s an unearned compliment, Wilbur thinks, but he whispers his thanks anyways.

“Can all mer do that thing with the stars and the water and that?”

“No,” Wilbur murmurs. “Just me.”

“Hmm.”

And the questions don’t stop. Wilbur doesn’t even realize how long they’ve been there until the horizon begins to fade from black as pitch to a fuzzy indigo.

“Oh.” Tommy sounds disappointed as his eyes follow Wilbur’s to the line where the sky dips into the water. “Do you have to go soon?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh.”

They sit in silence for a moment. Tommy seems to be thinking over something. He bites his lip and asks yet another question, but this one drops Wilbur’s stomach more than any of the others.

“Will you be coming back here tomorrow night, then?”

“I don’t- I’m not supposed to, you’re not supposed to have seen me at all-.” Wilbur drops his hand to rest on his tail. His throat bobs. “Do you… do you want me to?”

Tommy draws his knees up to his chest and buries his chin in the collar of his shirt. “It’s just- it’s nice to have someone who actually listens to me.”

Wilbur’s heart shatters a little and he bobs his head just a tad too frantically. It worries him, how easily he can be convinced to return. “Then, yes, I suppose.” He hesitates, tacking on, “As long as you promise not to tell anyone about me.”

The thrill of joy that rushes through the blond is tangible. His face lights up and he answers just as quickly.

“Cross my heart.” Tommy grins and hops off the rocks. “See you tomorrow!”

“See you tomorrow.” Wilbur waves goodbye, fastening his despised circlet back around his head before he dives into the waters. The starlight ripples and then shifts, returning at first into splotches, then orbs, and then drifting back up into its proper place in the night.

The cluster of rocks lay empty, and two new unlikely acquaintances part ways, one skipping down the white beach and the other sliding back into their own murky kingdom.

Moonlight beams down, but in the shadows it cannot reach, just out of eyesight, someone- or rather some _thing-_ watches on, a malevolent smile plastered across its face. Seeing everything, knowing everything.

The starlight runs with power, and the creature most seeking it has heard its luring call.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First chapter done, woohoo. Don't worry, the Little Mermaid plot will come into play very soon. I don't know what my upload schedule is going to be for this fic but I post little updates about it on my tumblr so look there if you're curious to see the behind-the-scenes. Unfortunately, I don't have a beta reader so it might take some time between updates (nothing too long, though).
> 
> This is my first multi-chapter fic so feedback/ criticism is much appreciated. I will also likely be making art for this AU so follow me on twitter and tumblr with @lilacadaisy for that. Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed. :)


	2. of hushed stories and unsteady seas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He wants more than to bridge the gap between human and mer in midnight meetings, he realizes, as Tommy spews on and on. He wants more, he wants there to be no bridge at all, for the two sides to collide and crash into each other, for the dirt to rise into mountains and the ashes to shape something entirely new.
> 
> Wilbur wants to be human.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings:  
> //panic attacks  
> //depictions of blood(?)

Wilbur can’t remember a time he’s ever been so on edge.

He returned the previous night to the castle, slipping softly into his bed like a thief in the night, but had woken up to sharp knocking on the chamber’s door, a maid telling him he slept in late while his heartbeat pounded in his ears. The starlight was still smeared across his fingers and he had scavenged his cabinets for sand imported from the Black Sea and a washrag. Then came the scrubbing, and it took a _lot_ of it. The flesh of his forearms is all sore and red now, some skin peeling back with the exfoliation, but at least the traces of the night before are gone.

He looks terrible, and he knows it, but he worries more about the suspicious changes in the tides he is informed about over breakfast and the reports of strange behavior from the fish told during tutoring by Grumps.

The day passes agonizingly slowly, every minute feeling as though someone will catch him by the shoulder, pull him into a side room and say _I know I know I know, and you are going to suffer the consequences_.

Punishment would be fine, Wilbur thinks. He’s had days before where he’s gone without a meal. He’s been barred from seeing Milo after arguments with his father. But he can’t help but bite at his already-scraped nails as he sits on the throne, pondering what his sentence would be for committing something of such grave caliber.

Mer have remained hidden for generations. The humans have been a mystery for centuries. Why did it have to be Wilbur who was stupid enough to bridge the divide between the two?

And Tommy.

Wilbur sends up silent prayers to Poseidon that Tommy is not just some wonderful actor who will show up tonight with a harpoon or net in tow.

Because, yes, Wilbur still plans on going. The thrill of the adventure continues to run high in his veins and even as he rubs at the blisters on his wrists from the morning’s scrubbing, the tingle of starlight still remains. If he clasps his nails into his wrist, he can almost _feel_ the stuff dripping like the blood that flows freely from the little crescent moon indents.

How could he _not_ go?

Perhaps tonight, he will even ask Tommy a few questions of his own. That is, if Tommy shows up. Wilbur winces. Gods, he _hopes_ he’s not being a fool for trusting- _no, not trusting, you can’t-_ for taking a human’s word.

Pretense has always left him dizzy with misunderstanding. Diplomats come with fronts, offering trade deals that he would usually sign without second thought, but his father narrows his eyes at, claiming that he “really should read the fine print”. Wilbur pinches the bridge of his nose in these meetings. He’s going to make a terrible king, he knows it.

The sea would be better off with quite literally _anyone_ else.

He smiles sadly. Gods, he’s pathetic.

But no one confronts him today. _Somehow_ not a single mer seems to have attributed the unusual behavior of the North Sea with him. It is a sweet relief that he manages to end the day in his room without a word from his father.

The dusk comes and goes, and anxiety pulses in Wilbur like a plague, his fingers going white from how tightly he grips the brass doorknob in wait. He does a once-over of his room, glancing at the moss pillows tucked beneath his silk sheets, ensuring that they replicate his sleeping form enough that no low servant would bother to give them more than a quick stare before skittering off. Then his eyes catch on a scroll sticking haphazardly from a half-closed desk drawer. He inhales sharply.

Tommy might like to see things from the world of the sea, he thinks. But what would a human _truly_ find interesting here? Their world had color and beauty while his held, well, nothing quite that special.

He settles on a necklace of pearls from an Indian Ocean ambassador and a notebook of song lyrics he’s scribbled out over the ages. No one has ever seen the book but him before and as he rummages through it to see if it’s suiting, he cringes at his own sloppy handwriting and nonsensical verses. But it will have to make do, because he’s quite certain Tommy wouldn’t want to see the North Sea’s ink pens and ceramic plates.

He stows the items in a woven kelp bag, slinging the strap around his shoulders and, fingers clammy, opens the door. The hinges are well-maintained, oiled recently to prevent rust, and he don’t think he’s ever been more grateful for that as he soundlessly drifts from his chambers to the stone and marble halls.

Guards patrol at night, but Wilbur’s managed to memorize their shift schedule after years of sneaking out to the land. Thirteen. He had been thirteen when he’d first disobeyed the orders. Six bloody years of fear and adrenaline.

He bites down on his tongue and, seeing an open archway, races through the gap. Just a little more past the edge of the stone, through the wall of enchantments- he shrinks back as the magic _burns_ like searing scorch marks. It’s an expected feeling, but over half a decade later and he still has not quite seemed to prepare himself for the scalding touch.

He shakes it off as best he can and plunges onwards.

Gasps for air when he reaches the surface and his gills fall into disuse. Shudders at the midnight air’s relative warmth. It’s late spring now, and the sun might bestow her kindness on the land, but the sea does not fare as well. Bone-chilling water becomes only _slightly_ numbing in cycle with the seasons, but it is never _warm_.

He approaches the unwavering cliffs. And feels his heart leap into his throat when Tommy is there atop their rocks, hands waving wildly above his head and hooting. No harpoon, no net, all excitement.

Wilbur takes a breather once he arrives, panting from the speed with which he propels himself through the last hundred yards of water.

Tommy is there, offering him a hand to pull him up on the rock. Wilbur takes it while the kid whoops in delight. “You’re _fast_ , holy shit.”

Wilbur’s eyes crinkle with a smile between his heaving. “You’re a bit young to be swearing now, aren’t you?”

“’M fifteen. I’m plenty old.” Tommy grumbles, crossing his arms as Wilbur settles on the cool granite slabs.

He notices the knapsack strung across Wilbur’s frame and his pupils practically dilate into orbs. “ _Did you bring presents?”_

“Mm, not for you, just show and tell.” This is so light, the conversation between the two of them, that he doesn’t even think about how forbidden it is. He retrieves the notebook and pearls.

“Lemme see.” Tommy wriggles his fingers wildly and Wilbur allows him to snatch the pearls from his grasp but keeps his hold on the song book. He has plans for tonight, an experiment to perform with the music.

Tommy twists the pearls in his fingers. The moon reflects in their glow and they seem to vibrate in the night, alight with waves of pure energy in the hands of a human. Distantly, Wilbur realizes, it’s because Tommy has a soul. He bites down the surge of envy that rises and instead suggests Tommy wear the necklace. It’s far too big on Tommy’s shoulders but the boy likes them, so they stay on.

“I feel guilty. My gift to you seems kind of stupid now.”

Wilbur’s eyebrows quirk up in unconcealed surprise. He watches as Tommy digs into the large front pocket of his khaki shorts, delicately removing a tangled wreath of something so colorful that Wilbur stops just to stare.

Oh, Poseidon. Are those-

“Flowers.” Tommy explains, pointing at each kind woven into each other in expert braids and knots. “These ones are lavender, they’re Techno’s favorite. And here’s marigold- Dad loves these ones when we go to the flower meadows on picnics- and there’s baby’s breath and sage and blue iris.” He gives a bright smile. “Here, you can keep it.”

Wilbur takes it as carefully as he can, gently cupping his hands as Tommy places it into his expecting palms.

He can’t remember the last time someone gave him something without expecting something in return.

He brushes a thumb over the smooth petals, staring intently.

How are such small things so beautiful?

“Thank you.” It comes out as a whisper. A promise, almost.

“It’s no problem, really. I just wish I could’ve got you more besides that.”

It’s not necessary. Wilbur sets the flower crown down as carefully as his trembling fingers allow, fearful that one wrong movement will send the fragile, delicate thing crumbling to ash.

He racks his brain for what to say. This gift is more than enough, but Tommy seems dissatisfied with Wilbur just accepting it for what it is.

Stories would be a gift, Wilbur thinks. He ponders only momentarily over whether he really should prompt Tommy to spill the secrets of human life, if he is violating some natural law of things just by asking the question. But the rules have already been broken, and the night is full of secrets, so despite his better judgement: “You could tell me about your world?”

Tommy blinks with surprise, seemingly unaware that a mer could ever want to hear such things. “Well, it’s, it’s a lot drier than the sea, I suppose. And- and there’s trees and stuff. I just, hmm…”

Wilbur brings his tail around him, resting his palms onto his propped-up elbows. “I’m all ears.”

“I don’t even know where to start with all the nature stuff.” Tommy sighs. “I guess, I guess I could just, I dunno, do you even want to know about my family?”

Wilbur nods warmly. Tommy sucks in air and puzzles for a moment before diving in. “I don’t know my _real_ family. Phil found me when I was, oh shit, mm, eight? Nine? They put me in an ‘ome, ya know? An orphanage?”

Wilbur, in fact, does _not_ know, but he pretends to so as not to interrupt, giving a slight hum of affirmation.

Tommy goes on. “So, I guess Phil- that’s Dad, y’know?- he found me and took me in. We have a… a house up on the cliffs not far from here. ‘S nice. I have my own bedroom. That was a weird thing at first. And there’s Techno, he’s older than me… eighteen now. When he turned an adult a while ago, I swear- he thinks he’s the king of the world now. He’s a bit… odd. Not quite… mm. Don’t know if you’d notice. Maybe.

“But, Dad’s nice. And Techno’s not completely awful, either. They’re both good and we go out on trips sometimes, the three of us. Like, we flew a kite, the other day, in the middle of a storm and I _swear_ I thought Techno was gonna get zapped. His hair would’ve been all frizzy and he’d have looked like a pink crispy idiot. He didn’t get struck, though. ‘S a shame, I would’ve loved to see the look on his face. Ooh, and then yesterday…”

Wilbur gets lost in the words, lost in the tales that Tommy weaves before him, albeit he can’t understand half of it. These people in the stories, Tommy’s family, they do so much. They don’t seem to have _any_ routine to their lives. Tommy mentions lessons once, and Wilbur perks up, hoping to relate, only to learn that Tommy’s lessons are taught by the man- Phil- and can range from learning the different types of earthworms to taking to the beachfront to be taught how to catch the winds in his sails. No mention of politics, of keeping a kingdom in check.

And why should there be?

The kid is _happy_ , while Wilbur is quite the opposite.

He wants more than to bridge the gap between human and mer in midnight meetings, he realizes, as Tommy spews on and on. He wants _more_ , he wants there to be no bridge at all, for the two sides to collide and crash into each other, for the dirt to rise into mountains and the ashes to shape something entirely new.

Wilbur wants to be human.

It hits like a harpoon to the chest.

The _yearning_ for what cannot be.

The sound of chatter goes all fuzzy and he’s far, far away from everything. He’s half in his own mind and half in the space between. The space between the stars and the sea, the horizon that begins to blur when he sings, the line that wraps his shoulders like a cloak, presses him down.

Little prince of the sea, there are only so many burdens you can hold at once.

“Hey, you good?”

Wilbur’s focus returns like he’s stepping through a thick mist. He blinks wearily, then nods. “Yeah, yeah, I’m alright.”

“You look a little pale, man. Like… paler than normal.”

Wilbur breathes and it comes out a shudder.

“Do you want me to continue?”

Wilbur doesn’t want to make Tommy think that he wasn’t listening. The sentences spilled out before him, though, feel like weights to pack up in neat little boxes and store in his mind for further inspection later on. Perhaps in full analyses of the workings of mankind, the type of essay that his tutor would assign him.

“Yeah, but can we… maybe take a break? Sorry, sorry.”

“Hey, it’s okay.”

They stare up at the stars, the constellations that chase each other over archer’s arrows and phoenix’s wings. Wilbur’s fingers twitch on the little notebook in his hand.

How much damage can he do? When will the waters of his actions begin to flood and drown him where he waits in blissful silence?

What is there to truly even lose?

He quivers.

Takes the plunge.

He makes the first of the moves that lead to his demise.

“You want me to sing?”

Tommy’s crystalline blue eyes sparkle like the pearls dangling across his collar.

“Yes, please.”

Wilbur tremors just a little as he flips open the notebook. He traces a thumb over the parchment that has been so smeared with squid ink and indented with grooves from a heavy-held pen.

It’s a stupid song, he thinks, as he briskly reads the looping scrawl that is his penmanship. All about misty mornings in May and cracked seashells and the ghost of a mer whose lover was murdered (that last one is absolute rubbish; mer don’t go anywhere after they die- they simply cease to be). He cringes at it, but Tommy’s leaning to look over his shoulder and he can’t turn back now, so he explains himself.

“I’ve never sung _words_ to the stars before, just melodies, so I wanted to see how it would influence the… you know.” He waves his hand around in a gesture to the water lapping at the rock around them. “The melting? I don’t know.”

Tommy’s brows furrow. He pauses. “You don’t know much at all about your magic, do you?”

Wilbur can only shake his head. No one’s ever had this branch of it before, not that he knows of, at least. He’s supposed to keep it secret, only use it when the need to becomes so overwhelming that he fears he might crumble if he doesn’t. All the royal bloodline has the gift of magic, their own unique skillset, but usually it doesn’t _eat_ at them like it does Wilbur. Doesn’t rip them apart from the inside, clawing like an animal at their throat, _commanding_ them to sing or act or speak.

It would kill him, he thinks, if he didn’t release it every once in a while.

For the first thirteen years of his life, it nearly did. Singing but being unable to see the power it truly held. Having to hum or whisper-sing in rooms by himself. His body had felt like a stinking stone, ever so weary and only worsening by the day.

“No, I don’t. But tonight, we might figure out something new. I can _feel_ it.”

Singing by itself is different than singing to the stars. It’s the intent, as his father would say, that makes all the difference.

“This one should do just fine, I think.” He pushes the book over so Tommy can read. It’s tense, those brief moments where the boy’s eyes skim across the page. The urge for validation strains within Wilbur, but he brushes it off as best he can.

“I don’t get half of it, but it seems good. Reminds me of the stuff Techno likes. Poems and that.”

Wilbur clears his throat awkwardly. Runs a hand across the black scales decorating his shoulders. He takes a shuddery inhale and the crisp night air expands his lungs with cold, bottled anticipation.

It begins softly, his murmurs little more than a humble hush against the breeze. The wind runs through his brown waves and ruffles the paper softly beneath his hands.

He feels stupid, sitting here, just reading words off a paper and throwing them into the world hoping they catch, but after a moment he feels his heart latch onto something, and then the stars begin to melt into the water.

This is familiar.

This is power.

The taste of it runs thick in his mouth. Like nectar, like honey, and this must be the feast of the gods, the sweet trace of ambrosia.

But nothing feels _different_ than normal, except the lingering sensation of Tommy staring straight at him. Right through him.

The boy soon busies himself, though, with observing the shallows, scooping the stars into his hands. He gathers it on his fingertips, and through the outward-spiraling cacophony of haunting melody, he whispers, “I wish I were mer sometimes.”

Wilbur’s eyes widen, the song near skidding to a stop, but he manages to go on by breaking from reading the lyrics. New turns of phrase and rhymes appear just as he clears the last, and he snatches them greedily, pouring them out to the stars like sand sprawling across the coast. It takes him a moment to realize that he’s coming up with them on the spot.

It’s so unnatural that it’s almost frightening.

Who has he become in two days’ time?

Certainly not the same caged prince as before. He’s a captive to his seas, yes, but there’s a roar in his ears now, a distant buzz saying _you already know what you have to do_.

He supposes he does. The song goes on.

It curls and loops, diving in and out. It’s every speck of the water, every creature, every star, and he thinks this is going somewhere, his mind is telling him _yes, keep going, you’re almost there_ and he listens to it, clawing out the inner scraps of himself to make room for whatever this strange, wonderful _new_ is. There’s caverns in his heart’s chambers and his arteries and the veins that run blue down his arm. His lips are pale and he’s _basking_ with it. He’s so close to what he has to become. Just a little more now-

Tommy turns back from where he is hunched over the water and locks gazes with Wilbur.

He yelps, scrambling backwards, a hand clasped against his mouth.

Wilbur stops immediately, panic infiltrating his voice. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

“Your _face_.”

Wilbur brings a trembling hand up to his cheek and feels it immediately. The starlight that courses down his chin in blotchy warmth. He splutters out words that don’t make sense because his nose is bleeding starlight what the actual _fuck-_.

All at once very dizzy, he glances down. It runs down his neck, across his torso, smeared and bleeding gold and he’s _lightheaded_. The world spins just a bit at the edges and oh gods, he’s gone too far. The Earth’s axis is shifted and he sees everything differently, through a grainy filter, the edges blackening to darker than night, than oil, than his tail.

“ _What’s happening_?” he screeches, and Tommy is shouting something Wilbur can’t hear.

It feels like a spark at first, in his chest.

And then it _expands._

He’s coughing, hacking, trying to get the feeling out but it won’t, it won’t, it won’t. There’s something strange, something where there once was nothing and it _burns._ It’s a fire that begins and goes on for eternity, circled in endless rings of infinity and drunk from the cupped hands of gods. He’s spitting up starlight onto the rocks and his throat _aches_ with the burn _._ This is what hell is like for the humans who get to go there. This is scalding and tearing and ashes churned with smoke.

It goes away as abruptly as it arises. A flash in his eyes and then absolute silence besides the pounding of his heart, his panting, and Tommy’s crying.

 _Tommy’s crying_ , he realizes. And suddenly nothing else matters.

“Hey, hey.” He looks up. “I’m okay, I’m okay. Hey, look at me.”

Water drips from the corners of Tommy’s eyes and his chest is rising and falling _far_ too quickly. He’s hyperventilating and Wilbur shrinks back because for a second there’s _fear_ in those bright blue eyes, but then it’s gone with a blink.

Fear for him?

Or _of_ him?

It doesn’t matter. He extends a hand to Tommy. It glows molten white with the stars. Wilbur wants to scrub it clean with black sand, but he holds it steady, an unspoken offer.

Tommy takes it.

Wilbur pulls him close to him, folds his arm around him, but not in a squeeze. He’s too frightened.

“Ok, deep breaths, alright? Follow my lead.”

Tommy bobs his head, shaking violently into Wilbur’s shoulder.

Wilbur breathes in for five counts. Tommy follows behind, though his inhale is punctured with sobs. They hold for five. Release for eight. Again.

The cycle goes on for so long that the starlight in the water returns to the sky without disruption. The thick stuff of the gods coating Wilbur’s skin, however, does not. It stains.

Tommy’s sobs turn to shakes and then settle into the occasional hiccup.

Only once Wilbur thinks he’s calmed down enough does he back away to make eye contact.

“It’s okay. I’m alright, see?” he murmurs, placing a hand on his own chest, where the burn had raked through him like a spear.

Tommy nods.

He lets out a breathy exhale. Through the clouds, moonlight beams down on him, casting him in light, and the gold of his hair reflects like sunshine. He seems so young now, it’s startling. Wilbur feels a pang of guilt. _He_ caused this. _He_ made Tommy cry.

Something in the air shifts. The Heart of the Sea whispers to Wilbur to look, to be attentive, and he purses his lips, searching the horizon. The clouds are beginning to cluster, and though usually they never disappear, only drift about at night for the stars to come out, they now grow grey and heavy. Too swiftly, too agitated. A surge of panic clutches Wilbur by his gut. He’s passed the limits. He’s brought upon his own doom.

Little prince.

Do you realize what you’ve done?

 _Yes_ , he thinks. _I have._

But he can’t abandon Tommy without warning him. The violent colors of purple, gold, blue, and white wrapped together catch his eye. The flower crown lays motionless atop the rock, discarded beside the lyric book. Wilbur’s fingers twitch. This is the calm before the storm. And he knows it.

He doesn’t mean to move so jerkily, to make the younger boy cry out as he latches onto his shoulders in one sharp motion, but he can’t articulate what he wants to properly after all that’s happened. He spins him so they’re mere inches apart, looking each other dead in the eyes. Icy blue meets an umber so dark it sits on the threshold of black. “Tommy. Do not. Go swimming. Or fishing. Or sailing tomorrow. _Don’t._ Don’t come to the sea, don’t leave your house, and _especially_ don’t come to this rock at night. Do you hear me?”

Confusion etches itself into every line of the boy’s face and Wilbur hates himself. Hates that he has to do this.

“Wait, I don’t- I don’t understand.” Tommy’s voice cracks and Wilbur winces. This is just a child, this is just a boy who never should have seen a mer, who shouldn’t have to face the consequences of Wilbur’s stupidity. “Did I do something wrong? Why can’t we-?”

“No!” Wilbur cuts him off without meaning to. There’s a faint buzzing far on the horizon, just perceptible enough to ring uncomfortably in his ears. “No, no, this isn’t your fault. It’s mine, I messed up, and- and we can’t do this again. We were never supposed to, and _trust me_ , I’m sorry.”

Something flickers in Tommy’s eyes. His voice swells in beat with the drum of the steadily rising waves beginning to wash ashore. “How am I supposed to trust what you’re saying when I don’t even know your name?”

Wilbur’s breath hitches. He lets go of Tommy’s shoulders. The world is _wrong_. The bridge of two sides is shaking, and it only takes one bolt of lightning to send it crashing into the endless pit below. Sea and land were never supposed to meet. Why did Wilbur think he could ever get away with this?

Only a day ago, an hour ago, he’d been reckless.

What is there to truly even lose? The words echo through his mind, seeping through him, bleeding him out like the moonlight from the heavens.

How had he been so _blind?_

 _This_ was his everything now. It was right in front of him.

“Tommy. Go home. Stay there. _Please_. Tell your father and brother to do the same, too.” Wilbur’s voice is choked. He’d be crying right now, he thinks, if he were human. Then he scolds himself at the idea because _you are nothing but mer. Don’t think for a second you will_ ever _be able to understand what it is to cry, you stupid, useless prince._

There is a rumble in the distance and Tommy starts at the sound. Wilbur uses the moment of distraction for his escape. Before he launches himself back into the wretched water, though, he snatches the flowers from the granite’s rocky surface. They dangle limply in his starlight-smothered grasp, all the color and beauty seeming to dull each passing second he holds them.

He splashes into the rocking water. Doesn’t look back.

“Wait!” he hears the cry behind him and flinches, but continues onward, straight-faced. “Wait, stop!”

There’s a million things Wilbur wants to say, a million questions to ask and another million to answer, but everything dies on the tip of his tongue.

 _Pathetic_ , he thinks, _that I can’t even manage one measly “goodbye”._

And while the rain begins above, he dives down to face the storm he knows waits below.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my goodness, I can't thank you all enough for the support on the first chapter. Over 350 reads in a day?? That's mental. And I even recognized some of the people who left kudos. So many talented writers. And to all you lovely people who subscribed to read more, you hold my entire heart. I can't thank you enough. <3
> 
> We're getting into the plot now haha. The work doesn't have the angst tag for no reason. If you'd like updates anywhere, follow my twitter and tumblr @lilacadaisy. I also have some mer art in the works!
> 
> Feedback/ criticism of any kind is much appreciated. Hope you enjoyed! :)


	3. the bittersweet tang of copper

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Death is a beacon, Death is kind, but Death shares no pity for those who roam the Earth without ever truly living.
> 
> Death holds her breath. Death spreads her wings. She is more living than Wilbur. He knows, he knows.
> 
> On nights like tonight, with storms brewing and prayers spent, Wilbur likes to imagine that Death lurks as a shadow just over his shoulder. Out of sight, but always nearby. She guides him to where he must go, an obedient guardian angel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings:  
> //minor character death  
> //descriptions of (imagined) corpse  
> //blood  
> //violence  
> //mild derealization

Whenever Wilbur’s mind spirals into oblivion like now, he tends to go back to the one day he’ll never be able to forget, no matter how much he blanks or spaces or scribbles his thoughts out in alarming tatters of _self_.

It all goes back to the morn of a fateful October day.

Crisp water.

Dark skies.

Much like any other day, in so many ways, but entirely _not_ all the same.

He had woken from his sleep from where he rested on a chair propped up next to his mother’s cot, but the cricks in his neck and back were the least of his concerns. A weak, clammy hand ran through his curls, brushing back his hair so that his eyes were no longer concealed by the fringe.

“Mother.” His voice was strained.

She smiled at him sadly, glassy dark stare unwavering from her son. She hadn’t moved- hadn’t even been conscious- in _weeks._ Where were the doctors? The palace medics? Shouldn’t they be there? But no, mother and child lay absolutely alone, the cold nothingness burbling around them, an ugly ceramic vase of muted coral their only onlooker.

Wilbur wafted from drowsiness, scrambling upwards, losing the sensation of fingers running across his scalp to the movement. He was but eight years old. He didn’t know what he was supposed to do.

“Mother, I don’t- you’re _up.”_

At this point in the memory, she mumbles, but over time, her voice has gone fuzzy in recollection, so it’s more just speech than sound. “Yes, my little prince.”

His throat was hoarse. “Mother, Father’s been so strange. You have to talk to him. He’s not acting normal-.”

She interrupted gently. “I’m sorry, Wil. I don’t think I have the strength to anymore.”

“What-,” Wilbur’s voice was laced with rust, with the stretch between coast to coast, with an innocence too virtuous for their kingdom. “What do you mean?”

The queen blinked wearily. Fogginess clouded her, embraced her. She was succumbing, Wilbur realizes now. “Remember the stories, Wil? Ashes to ashes?”

He hesitated before finishing, “Dust to dust. But, Mother, you’re awake. You’re _better_.”

“There’s poison here, Wilbur. It’s me. Us. It’s in my bones, now.”

Fear raced through the boy’s veins. He was young, but even he knew about poison from his tutor’s lessons constantly drilled into him from the time he was old enough to swim. _Always have an expendable servant taste food first_. _Never eat under an enemy’s roof._

“Mum?”

Her eyes drifted shut and Wilbur’s heart squeezed, but mutters poured from her lips like honey and gold. “Yes?”

“Are you scared?”

It was an odd question, Wilbur thinks, in retrospect. He wishes so desperately he had gone to get help.

“Wilbur, my little prince.” She was cracking at the seams, at the edges, all sea glass shattered against a throne, a broken mirror, a fragmented conch shell. “Poseidon’s calling me home. I’ve never been less terrified.”

Wilbur clasped his hands- so small, so smooth, untouched by the cruelty of the world- around his mother’s wrist. She smiled.

“But Mother, _I_ am.” He was shuddering.

“Oh, my darling. I know. Do not fear. One day you’ll save this dreadful place. One day you’ll understand and, Gods, you’ll do what must be done.”

She was slipping. He knew it and so he did what everyone always said they regretted avoiding.

He said goodbye.

He embraced her, wrapped his small frame around her like a newborn. “I love you, Mother.”

“I love you, too.”

They stayed there for minutes or hours.

She faded to seafoam on what felt like the earliest of dawns.

It was his first encounter with Death. Death, who, in all her splendor, is the cruelest when she claims those with no soul to reap. No soul to carry over to a land of milk and honey. No soul to scatter to the winds.

Mer leave this world without a trace of their existence remaining.

There is no body to bury in the sea’s sand. No cold, limp hand to hold.

And there are no tears to be shed.

Wilbur’s father moved on without a second thought. Maybe it had been denial at first, but it was clear after his feeble, impassive elegy at the disaster that was the funeral that he’d always planned to think forwards. The king was unburdened, but it only felt like his share of grieving was passed onto his son. Wilbur might as well have carried the weight of two lost, searching mer with all his years of silent mourning.

Death is a beacon, Death is kind, but Death shares no pity for those who roam the Earth without ever truly living.

Death holds her breath. Death spreads her wings. She is more living than Wilbur. He knows, he knows.

On nights like tonight, with storms brewing and prayers spent, Wilbur likes to imagine that Death lurks as a shadow just over his shoulder. Out of sight, but always nearby. She guides him to where he must go, an obedient guardian angel.

He passes through the wall of magic into the realm of the palace. His skin is crawling with goosebumps and his heartbeat and thoughts both clamor in his ears, vying for his attention.

Nose to navel is run silver and gold, stained. He is little more than a canvas of power, painted with thick brushstrokes of his own undoing. The hint of imagined pain runs true through it, a phantom ghost to join Death in the posse swimming ever closer to the stone and marble palace. There is little to be done about it. Wilbur marches on, biting the inside of his cheek in tune with the hymn of his pulse.

Wilbur grew up himself. After eight years, there was no longer an adult’s tail to latch onto. Sure, he was _raised_ by others, but none taught him the important things. Like how to communicate. Or speak up for himself when he felt he might drown in his own thoughts. Or how to avoid the nastier effects of repressing his magic.

His father couldn’t even watch him from the wings, instead opting to only spare him the occasional disapproving glance to ensure he was steady on the path towards becoming the king of the North Sea when Death eventually took the sea’s reigning sovereign, too. Diplomacy and lessons are the only tokens of his childhood. He is caught in a current, a riptide wasteland of his adolescent years spent just trying to get by. It pulls and it tugs, all leading him to here, the foot of the castle.

Poseidon have mercy on him.

There is a wrongness buzzing in the walls that he drifts through. No guards patrol, no maids blink nervously from their shadowed stairwells. Everything leeches away from him, the very soul of the sea parting to let him pass through the towering halls. This is the path to the slaughter.

He tries to keep his chin high as he enters the throne room but fails almost immediately when he first sees his father’s icy grey glare. The trident in his hand gleams wickedly, the three prongs extended out to him, but certainly not in welcome. It hums with the same power in the Heart of the Sea atop Wilbur’s brow. A weapon forged by the gods and bestowed upon the nobility so supposedly blessed by the divine right of kings.

“Wilbur.”

It is a low rumble in his chest. It is the eye of the storm.

“What have you done.”

It is not a question, so Wilbur doesn’t reply, just clasps his hands behind his back and tucks his chin to his chest where his eyes fall to the starlight smothering both fabric and skin there. His lower lip trembles and he bites it hard enough that he tastes metal.

“There is something to be said about your behavior.” A snarl. Wilbur flinches. “That it should not have been a surprise, perhaps. That it is a disgrace, of course. That it shows how little you seem to care about that worm of a human, most certainly.”

Wilbur shivers. He knows it all, then. He cannot be spared a single secret.

“It is a good thing Eret here followed you to the surface or you might very well have told the human where our palace is.”

He gestures behind Wilbur, and a flicker in his peripherals sends his vision a blinding white with rage. He wants to lash out at the guard who told his father. Of all the nights he’s snuck away, why tonight? Traitor to the crown, that bastard is. But at the same time, Eret was just following their obligations, so he seethes in silence.

One of the petals tucked desperately away in Wilbur’s clammy palms drifts to the floor. The king’s eyes trail it as it tumbles and hits the marble.

He scoffs. “And just look at yourself. So easily won over by trivial things of their lands. And in return- your magic? What a waste, just to show off to their kind. The entire sea felt the aftershocks of that little stunt you pulled. Such selfish behavior of someone who is of your rank.”

Wilbur doesn’t care about what he’s done to the kingdom, though. His mind is reeling around only one thing, and he bursts out without quite meaning to, “Tommy’s young. He didn’t mean to find me. He just stumbled across me singing. It was unintentional. It was entirely my fault. He’s _innocent_.” He clings urgently to the lavender and blue iris, the sage and the marigold as though it’s his only tether to the world.

A pause. His father’s shoulders fall and for a second, there is almost _hope_ that rises in Wilbur. Hope that it might not come to the worst, that they can simply agree that he will never set fin near the coast again. But it is a foolish assurance.

“It is most a shame, then, that we have to kill him.”

Wilbur lurches forward but there are suddenly hands clasped on his forearms and shoulders and someone is pulling him back. He fights against it.

“No!” he cries, hurling himself, fraught and crumbling and grasping for what little strength he has left in as much retaliation as he can muster. His voice cracks. “You can’t. He’s just a kid. I- I won’t let you.”

The king’s eyes narrow to slits of beady disgust. “You? Wilbur, you wouldn’t be able to stop me even if you had Poseidon’s ichor running in your veins.” His eyes flicker to the mer that clutch his son’s arms. “Lock him in his room and keep post there until we manage to find the human.”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” someone is saying, but Wilbur can barely hear.

Can barely think.

Someone rips the flowers away from him.

He howls and he twists, but the grip on him is too strong. Mer are shouting, trying to peel him away from where he clings onto the stone walls at every corner and passage. They overpower him easily, though, dragging him through the halls that plunge into meaningless, and before he knows it, he is thrown into his room, the brass latch _click_ ing behind him in a solemn resonance.

He throws himself at the door, but it doesn’t budge. Tries to pick the lock with hair pins and pens. It doesn’t work. He yells and pounds at the packed driftwood with his fists, but no one responds. Occasionally, he hears mutters from someone outside, but they are not directed towards him.

It goes on for… minutes? (Hours?) Until his knuckles are bruised blue and his voice has become all raspy and _wrong_. He sinks to the marble tiled floor in a heap, shuddering with each passing breath.

They’re going to kill him.

They’re going to kill Tommy and they won’t let him out until they do and by then it will be too late and Tommy…

He sees Tommy’s body twisted and blemished, dripping red onto the granite rock below, bleeding the water crimson. His bright blue eyes pale and glazed over, staring towards the stars but never actually seeing them. He sees a necklace of pearls gone silent strung around Tommy’s neck, choking him, leaving his collar tainted with pallid yellow.

Wilbur shakes his head. Bile rises in his throat and he fears he might retch.

The image won’t leave his mind, no matter how much he digs his nails into his skin.

He warned Tommy. But he should have done more. Should have stayed there, sent him home, protected him, guarded the beachfront like its warden. (He should have grown legs and run far, far away to protect the boy, but that’s impossible.) He can only pray Tommy doesn’t so much as think about returning, but a plunging, stabbing _knowing_ in his chest tells him otherwise.

The door is bolted and there are no windows, no other means of escape.

So he lays. He waits.

It’s agony.

It’s worse than the burn of starlight in his chest, in his nose, running down his skin where even now it remains.

The brass handle wobbles a long time later and he jolts, but by the time he springs up from the ground the door has open and closed already, the only alteration in the room that a plate of food has been laid on the stone before him.

Steaming crab cakes topped with lemon zest and sprinkled with basil. His favorite.

He hurls it against the wall. The ceramic smashes with such force he cowers from the sound. There is shouting outside.

Wilbur smiles to himself, pleased. _Good. I’ve startled them._

But then there is a sharp _thud_ and a yelp. The door trembles with the vibrations of something heavy slumping against it and Wilbur suddenly doesn’t think he’s the cause behind the commotion anymore.

The lock clicks once more and then the door swings open. A shadow looms, fists bloody and bent over in the doorframe, but towering all the same. A kelp mask shields the lower half of a mer’s face, leaving only piercing green eyes visible, ones that cut through Wilbur with such ferocity he startles. Gold is smeared across their lids and a dark black cloak, the hood of which is drawn up tight over the mer’s head, billows in the water around them. Slumped at their fins are two guards seemingly unconscious. _Hopefully_ unconscious.

The masked mer’s voice is muffled only slightly. “Your Highness.”

Wilbur glances around the room for something sharp to defend himself with, but the only thing he can come up with is a shard of the plate. He cuts himself scrambling to pick it up, but at least he feels a touch less puny, just a little less vulnerable.

“You come on behalf of my fa- the king?” he asks, pointing the makeshift weapon in the intruder’s direction, pointedly ignoring the way their luminous eyes watch the blood drip down his shaking hands with something akin to amusement.

Their voice is a laugh speckled with what is almost offense. “Please. Do I look that stupid? I’m under no one’s orders besides my own, especially not your dad’s.”

Wilbur blinks. He doesn’t know whether to lower his weapon or tighten his hold on it at that. Curiosity knocks him out of his blank stupor and he drawls, “Then why’re you here?”

The mer sighs, pinching the bridge of their nose through the mask. The motion is so smooth, so unfiltered by the darkness of the sea, that it makes Wilbur stare at them just a little longer. He squints and- and the shadows around them seem to almost _flicker_ in response, curling in flintlike whisps and branches around the mer _._

“Poseidon save me,” they say, exasperated, to the ceiling, and then- to the prince- “I’m here to _help_ you.”

“How?” It spills out of his mouth too snappish, and the corners of the mer’s eyes quirk upwards.

So fast Wilbur doesn’t even see it, they slide down the mask until it hangs loosely around their neck.

Dread pools in Wilbur’s stomach.

“The Sea Witch?” his mother had whispered once as she was tucking him into bed, when he asked about the name he’d read in the storybooks. “Oh yes, he’s real. And you’ve seen him before, without even realizing it, in all the shadows and mirrors. Trust me, you’ll know him if you meet him, and, if you do, _swim_.”

He knows now.

The grin in front of him brings a surge of familiarity rushing to the surface of his skin and Wilbur bristles with unease.

“Ah” is all he can manage.

The smile widens. “You’ve heard of me.”

Wilbur’s gills don’t seem to be working. His head is going all fuzzy, like he isn’t getting quite enough oxygen.

“Yes, I have.”

It’s unsettling, the way Wilbur almost hears _wailing_ when he meets those green eyes, so he looks someplace else. _Anywhere_ else. His heart is beating in his throat and he fixates his sight on a mildly interesting spot on the ceiling.

“Recognized by royalty.” The witch clutches his heart to his chest in feigned glee. “I’m honored.”

The Heart of the Sea weighs heavier than ever, hissing into Wilbur’s mind to _get away, for gods’ sakes._ But the stories he’s pored over as a child simmer within him. And all stories have at least some truth to them, do they not?

The devil is in the dark and the depths, waiting, listening, and he plays his games with a smile spread across his features. He’s come for mer before and they’ve disappeared into nowhere, gone without a trace. Wilbur has heard the weeping of their families before at the foot of his throne, begging for searches across the sea, but the king dismisses them, claiming that they must simply have run off.

No correlation to the ancient monster of childhood whispers and night terrors, he claims.

The mer floating about before Wilbur is all ivory and ivy and ignition. All the ink sprawled across picture books with crinkled corners and broken spines. There is nothing burning, but Wilbur smells smoke.

He prays to no god in particular that he is not playing right into his own grave.

He lacks much in self-preservation. He lowers the ceramic shard. Inhales deeply. “You said you’ll help me?”

“Yes, but I’d rather you not be trapped here before we discuss.”

“Discuss?”

“Oh, you’ll see. I think you’ll like what I have in mind for you. Of course, I’m a man of many talents. And,” he gestures towards Wilbur. “It’ll take quite some work to sneak you out of here like _that,_ so we’ll be doing this the easy way.”

He claps his hands together and the sound, while distorted underwater, is still loud enough to make Wilbur flinch. His eyes involuntarily drop to the open doorframe. Surely more guards will be on the way soon.

“You’re concealed now. I recommend not looking at yourself too long. You might find it disorienting.”

Wilbur glances down. He’s just- gone. He’s not there. Panic rises in his throat. He sees right through the spot where he knows- _he knows or else nothing is truly real-_ that his tail and his fins are. But nothing is there besides the shattered plate and discarded food on the floor.

He’s real. He has to be. He _must_ be.

The Sea Witch slides his mask back up. “Follow me. I’m not going to swim fast enough to lose you, but we’ll be going quick to avoid any… family reunions.”

Wilbur blinks back the sudden swell of drowsiness that overtakes him and nods, even though he’s… decently certain that the mer cannot see the confirmation.

They take off.

Wilbur catches a glimpse of the blood racing down the two guards’ temples and decidedly looks away. Call him a coward, it doesn’t matter, he already tells it to himself every night.

The halls span out before them and the Sea Witch navigates through them like they are memorized, which is okay by Wilbur since he’s trapped in his own thoughts, tossing them back and forth in endless competition. Mindlessly, he trails behind the mer like together they are shepherd and lamb, ducking into shadowy halls every now and again, shifting through what little light is in what feels similar to a game Wilbur used to play when he was barely six.

He squeezes the ceramic into his palm, feeling it slice into the skin there, just to confirm that this is real. _None of this feels real_. It is like an illusion, like a trick his mind is playing on him as he shrieks on the floor of his bedroom chambers. If the world is spiraling out of verity so quickly, what is to say that he isn’t, either?

The openness of the sea comes too quickly, and he gasps as he realizes the castle is sinking in the distance behind them, merely a dust mote that fades into nothing once they cross the border of the magic. He hopes to Poseidon it is the last time he lays eyes upon it.

They slide through the sea like eels, cutting through water at a rapid pace. Silently, Wilbur turns over the idea of just branching off to go to the surface, but then his invisibility drops from him like a shield being lowered. The Sea Witch gestures him on. “Almost there now.”

The prince is confused with what the mer wants with him if the “help” extends beyond just escaping. Does he expect some sort of payment? Jewels? Gold? Wilbur grimaces. The satchel he had brought last night, one of its pockets containing a hidden stash of coins, would be a comfort right now, but it has been left abandoned in his chambers after his catastrophic return.

The rolling plains of emptiness that surround the castle begin to shift as they move on. The terrain begins harsher, jutting out in spikes of black he’s certain are not natural to the sea. They cluster in formations that piece together into sculptures of abstract claws of death. If a mer were to get too close, they’d certainly be torn to shreds at the hands of a crystal spike’s polished point.

And Wilbur is a prince of the sea and he is supposed to be able to hear his kingdom whisper, but the Heart of the Sea has gone dead silent. Everything feels unfamiliar, like it’s out of his reach.

They continue on.

He’s lost in his own thoughts when one of them speaks again.

“Welcome to my humble abode,” the Sea Witch says as they crest a particular mountainous spike. Wilbur gapes at the sight.

Before him, the sea floor drops rapidly, giving away into a ravine that plunges so far below he cannot even see where its bottom waits. It is lined with rocky black stone, fractured with crevices that glow a painful lime green. The glimmering ebony spikes descend with it, creating a sort of cavernous maze between the gulley walls that looks as though it were made for some merfolk sport in a distant land.

It looks like a death trap.

“Now, little prince,” the Sea Witch speaks softly. Wilbur’s heart seizes up at the nickname he hasn’t been called in so very long- Gods, it makes him ache to hear it and he has to shove down the urge to hiss _that is not your name to speak_ \- but putters out as the mer behind the mask goes on, “I take it you’ve never felt true fear before today.”

What kind of question is that? What does this sort-of-stranger know of Wilbur’s utmost fears? But Wilbur holds his tongue to keep his confusion from spilling out into the darkness between them.

“And I’m- I’m sorry you had to, even if I shouldn’t be. Your father is the worst man I’ve ever met. And to be raised by him? I feel pity at the very thought. So, I come with a- an offer, if you will.” Something lurks behind the words but Wilbur cannot reach it, cannot figure what it is that is bothering him before the Sea Witch’s hand loops gently around his wrist. There is no warning before he guides him down, down, through the gaps between the walls. Murky becomes murkier. What little light there is drains away until their vision is only lit by the strange green cracks in the rock.

It casts the world in anemic emerald. Wilbur’s never seen anything like it before.

Much farther down they travel until the ravine veers off, a large gap in the wall’s side carved out inexplicably, sheathed by vines that blanket the entrance in a cloak of mossy foliage. Wilbur is led through it, and he ducks into his shoulders at the strange, fleeting embrace. It tickles his nose and he has to stifle a sneeze. The Sea Witch snorts.

The claustrophobic cave is lined with shelves grooved into the three walls, full to the brim with glass, vials, and jars of things Wilbur couldn’t name if he tried. _Ingredients_ , he thinks.

Atop an obsidian dais raised at the exact center of the room, a cauldron hisses with steam and pops with the bubbles that rise to the surface. It’s enchanted, he realizes, to perform magic. This isn’t the familial magic he’s grown up with, though. This is spells and potions and dark things that crawl in the night, the matter of nursery rhymes meant to frighten but also to warn.

He lingers on the threshold, but the witch moves on ahead, dancing around, reading smudged ink on labels. He trails a hand across the rows, muttering beneath his breath.

“Uhh, so. Y- your offer?” Wilbur stammers. He feels _exposed_ here, like a thousand sets of eyes are sewn into the walls and observe him in content.

“Ah, yes. We are here now, aren’t we? Well, ooh-.” The mer’s fingers fasten around a hideously bright violet vial. He pops the cork and swiftly moves over to the cauldron. The scene might be near comical if not for the senseless expression etched into his stare. _He’s indecipherable_ , Wilbur thinks. The witch empties two drops into the mix before glancing back up at the prince. “Sorry. Distractions, ha. Now-.” He leans back against the cauldron, arms crossed, black tail swishing in front of him. “I have a proposal for you, little prince.”

“Do tell. I hope you didn’t drag me here just to play potions, Sea Witch.” Wilbur’s surprised at his own tone.

The mer lets low a _psh_ sound. “Drop the formalities. Call me Dream.”

“Oh.” Wilbur swallows his hesitance. “You can call me Wilbur, then, I guess.”

Dream’s glee is visible even with the mask concealing his permanent smile. “Excellent. Well, Wilbur, let's cut right to the chase. Speed this up."

He swears Dream's eyes linger on the Heart of the Sea for a moment.

"I come here today with the hopes of making you human.”

The world slips out from beneath Wilbur. His breaths come in small huffs through his gills.

It’s impossible.

The man considers his word choice for a moment and corrects, “Err, well, sort of. Legs, you know? Not that I can actually change your mer biology because _that_ would require, what? The gods? Even then, I doubt they could do it. Zeus strike me dead and all that. Oh, I’m rambling.” Dream laughs. Wilbur stares on in cloudy disbelief.

“You can _do_ that? I can-.” Wilbur’s voice crescendos and he bites it back to calm himself. His fingers clench around the ceramic he still holds. “I could… go up there? _Live_ up there?”

He’s coming across as frantic, but he truly doesn’t care.

“Certainly. Walk and run and dance. All the good things.”

“The catch?” Wilbur asks, because there is no way such a godly feat comes without a price.

Dream snaps his fingers and from one of the shadows crouching at his shoulder materializes a quill and a scroll. The latter is long, _so_ long, trailing to the floor in dozens of paragraphs of words.

“I can summarize, if you’d like.”

Wilbur nods sharply. He’ll spare any fraction of a second he can get if this is not some elaborate trick. If there is even a _chance_ he can leave this kingdom, he will cling to it like straw. He cannot let it slip between his fingers.

“One pair of legs in exchange for the instrument of your magic, your voice. Your words and laughter and screams. And, of course, you wouldn’t be able to touch the North Sea again or, well, we’re Poseidon’s children for a reason. Back to seafoam you’ll go.”

He delivers it with such lightness, such cheerfulness, that Wilbur is carried away with the gravity of it all. The words cradle him, taunt him, but worst of all tease him.

He thinks of the flowers torn from his hands.

Just _one_ meager voice and a kingdom he’d already flee from if he could.

Only everything he’s ever owned, he doesn’t think.

He doesn’t know what he’d expected. That he’d have to give Dream the seven oceans? The hidden sun? But this seems so much smaller in comparison than the wishes and ruins he’d been imagining.

The hint of starlight that still lingers in his chest hammers his heartbeat into a spike.

“What about my song?”

For the first time Wilbur’s ever seen it, Dream’s smile slides from his face. He can tell by the way his gold-tinted eyelids flinch. The look reminds him of his father’s harrowing grimace and he almost flinches.

_Is this a friend or a foe?_

The tone shifts. “Gone to the winds. No prayers to sing now, Wilbur.”

_An enemy?_

And it was his one respite, weaving the words to the stars and dipping them from the ether, but he thinks of a cottage he’s never seen and a family he’s never spoken to.

_Or perhaps he’s a blessing and a curse in disguise._

It doesn’t matter. It’s all the same.

“I’ll do it.”

His teeth dig into the inside of his cheek.

Delight. Uncontained, unveiled. “Just sign here, then.”

Wilbur takes the pen and the scroll but sinks when he realizes there is no ink.

“What do I sign _with_?”

“Now we don’t want more of those fragments in your hands during this, do we?”

Dream’s smile is wicked and he taps at the shard in Wilbur’s scarred, newly healed hands. The prince watches on in wonder as it _twists._ The ceramic sinks into itself, bending and morphing until it becomes jagged at the ends in cruel sawtooth edges. A hilt of sea glass and a milky green insignia manifest out of nowhere, reforming the chip of a plate into an ethereal knife to draw the thickest of blood.

Wilbur breathes out, admiring the way it gleams in the dim reflections.

He cuts it into his palm, understanding at once, and signs the line at the bottom of the parchment in his very own copper-crimson ink. Clenches his fist closed to stem the blood flow.

For the first time since they left the palace, he meets Dream’s steely eyes.

He cannot help but let out a startled shout when he sees his own reflected back at him. Dark and numb and devoid of any shine. He _hates_ looking into mirrors, but he can recognize himself in a stranger.

It dawns upon him that perhaps there is more than just one reason Dream wears the mask.

The Sea Witch smiles only wider. Turns, ladles the curved spoon into the cauldron. Draws it out, a hand cupped below it lest its contents spill from the enchantment into the water surrounding. He brings it to Wilbur’s mouth.

“Drink when you’re ready, oh son of the stars.”

Wilbur’s eyes widen, but when he goes to yelp, his lips part just enough to let the potion meet his tongue. It sizzles.

“Oh yeah. It might sting a little.”

The fire swallows him whole.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 3! God, this one was tough to write and I'm still not completely satisfied with it, but I hope you enjoyed nonetheless. I might go back sometime in the future and edit it, but for now, it should be fine for the plot moving forward. Also, thank you guys so much for your support. The feedback and comments I've been getting are just incredible. (Sorry it takes a while to respond sometimes; I've been very caught up with schoolwork and the such lately, but it truly does mean the world to me.)
> 
> Also! Ten minutes ago I made a design for Wilbur for this series (uncolored and very rough but in case you want a visual) that is linked [here](https://lilacadaisy.tumblr.com/post/646481590883631104/wilbur-mer-design)
> 
> SBI dynamics coming up soon wooooo!!!


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